The events of last Thursday night in the Stade de France were not the cause of much cheer among the Irish who were present. Yet amid the 36-14 defeat, there were a few notable landmarks, not least that two of the four Irish debutants marked the occasion with a try, one of whom, Michael Milne, was celebrating his birthday.
His parents, Ger and Pauline, and four sisters – Kelly, Amy, Lisa and Aimee – were also in attendance.
“After the match they were all looking at me like they were all hammered, so I was like, ‘oh Jesus’. But they seemed to enjoy it anyway,” said Milne.
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Within three minutes of his arrival, he also marked the occasion with his first try in Test rugby, although he had an anxious wait when his finish was referred to the TMO to check the grounding. Was he worried it might be chalked off?
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“A small bit, but thank God I hid it down here so he couldn’t see it,” he said, pointing to his stomach. “But after he asked me if I scored it, I just gave him a nod and thought: ‘Please God, he gives it to me’.”
A product of Roscrea College, he’s also the first player from Birr RFC to play for Ireland. His Six Nations debut was also a source of celebration in his hometown, from where he had received “a lot of messages” all week.
“It’s a big hurling stronghold, so I think people were still a bit iffy, but I know my mates had a bet on me to score a try, so I must give them a message and see how it went.”
“It’s also a huge source of pride being the first player from the club to play for Ireland.
“Birr have been great to me. I went to Roscrea in my second year and Birr always supported me. I love the club. It’s a good community down there.
“As it’s a big hurling town, so you don’t really think about rugby. Then Peter Smyth came down when I was in sixth year and offered me a Leinster academy contract and I suppose that’s when you have to try.
“I was still hurling with Birr intermediate at the time, so I was standing in the square in the full forwards, so that’s probably when I took it really seriously, yeah.”
Milne revealed that the replacements, with James Ryan leading the way, had placed an emphasis on bringing physicality.
“I think that was the main thing we thought we lacked from the first half. So, as a bench, Cheese [Ryan] leading it, in bringing physicality when we came on, that was the main thing we were aiming for.”
The Birr man expressed his gratitude to Ireland scrum coach John Fogarty after the depowered pack actually performed strongly in both set pieces.
“Fogs has been working us very hard. I probably should thank him; he stuck with me for a while. I had a bit to learn, but he’s been working us really hard, so it paid off every time.”
Milne was also grateful to the Irish team’s performance coach Gary Keegan in readying hm for the biggest occasion of his career in front of an 80,000 capacity Stade de France crowd.
“I actually did a lot of work with Gary Keegan this week just to try and deal with that, so I owe him a lot as well; he’s very good.
“It’s probably not something I’ve looked at before in my game, but after spending a week with him I was like, ‘wow, actually going into the game I was really excited, whereas before sometimes you’d be a bit nervous and you’d actually feel a bit drained. But after doing work with him for a week, I felt really excited. And I was ready to go, so yeah, I enjoyed it.”
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At 27, it has been a long time coming.
“I was actually 24th man for the French game in the Aviva three years ago, so I got a bit of a taste there. Everything’s just quicker, everything’s more physical. Scrums and lineout are obviously a big part of the game. It’s a quick learning curve, but obviously, it’s very enjoyable; you get to test yourself against the best.
“There’s obviously a few injuries in my position, so when I came into camp I was like, right, this is an opportunity now, I’m going to try and take it. Just take it day by day and go from there.”
